At Northwest Management Inc our services encompass all rural, urban, and wildland resources, their use, conservation, development and restoration. There is tremendous variation between properties, within a property and between land owners, therefore no “one” answer will fit every challenge. Your forestland health and sustainability is our priority, let us help attain your goals.

Assessing the health of a forest must consider many factors including:

The occurrence and distribution of insects and disease

Light, water, nutrients available to the forest

Tree species, spacing, age, and other vegetation

Wildlife, water resources and human influences

Identification of risk and trends

Forest Growth

NMI has provided forest inventory and forest management planning services since 1984. Annually, NMI completes timber assessments on 100,000 to 150,000 acres across Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Colorado and Montana. This includes inventory cruising, third party cruising for land exchanges, grade cruising, and appraisal cruising. Our clientele includes family forests (NIPF) owners, tribes, state and federal agencies, and industrial forestland owners.

NMI utilizes growth simulation and projection models to assist in the development of silvicultural prescriptions and to evaluate the effectiveness of various stand treatments. Growth models we employ are:

Forest Vegetation Simulator (FVS) – from the U.S. Forest Service

Forest Projection System (FPS) – from Forest Biometrics’

Stand Projection System (SPS) – from Mason, Bruce and Girard

Timber Inventory and Valuation

NMI has provided more than 30 years of timber inventory and analysis data on forests across the Northwest for landowners both private and public ranging from 5 acres to 500,000 acres in ownership. We pride ourselves in providing efficient accurate data and analysis to facilitate achievement of your resource management goals whether they be timber harvest, investment, land sale, or wildlife habitat and aesthetics.

Some of the inventory and valuation services we provide are:

Timber volume (on-the-ground cruise) and inventory

Timber value per acre estimates

Estate Planning

Log Marketing Analysis

Timber harvest permitting and management plan establishment

Harvesting, harvest equipment, and landing placement

Timber Sale Administration

A timber sale occurs when merchantable trees are deemed necessary to be removed from the forest, for a commercial harvest. In conjunction with improving forest health, some of the many reasons landowners decide to sell their timber are to reduce fuel loads, implement wildlife management, and create revenue.

What you can expect from NMI for your Timber Sale:

Contract Development

Log Marketing

Sale Layout/Timber marking

Permitting

Contract Administration

Oversight of log tracking

Logscale reporting

Log Market Analysis

Northwest Management, Inc. (NMI) for the past 30 years has developed an effective log marketing system that provides our clients with the highest net return for their forest products. NMI will combine multiple timber sales into one package, which can reduce harvesting and transportation costs and increase the total sale volume to capture the highest prices for your timber.

Since 1982, Northwest Management, Inc. has documented delivered log prices in the Inland Northwest. We began producing a quarterly Newsletter, Inland Northwest Market Report, in 1998 which contains the Log Market Report for Eastern Washington, North Idaho, and Montana.

Roads – Layout, Inventory and Assessment

Forest roads whether used for access to a home, timber harvest or property recreation must meet stringent construction and environmental conditions. These conditions are critical to minimize maintenance of the road surface and to protect the forest and water resources it provides access to or through. Northwest Management Inc. has over 75 years of combined road work experience. More importantly, our extensive understanding of natural resources and ecosystem function provides us a unique advantage during road layout, permitting, assessment and construction or obliteration administration to achieve the best possible outcome.

Fire as a Management Tool

Northwest Management, Inc. is directly involved in the fuels hazard reduction on 12,000 to 15,000 acres annually. The prescription of “fuel hazard reduction” is provided to our clients in order to meet or exceed the Idaho State Hazard Reduction Law guidance, to prepare harvested sites for reforestation, and to maintain nutrient cycles.

NMI develops the majority of prescribed fire burn plans for much of Northern Idaho through our wide range of differing clients including the St. Maries, Deary and Clearwater districts for Potlatch Corporation and the North and South Divisions for Hancock Forest Management in Idaho.

NMI implements all burn plans as weather conditions permit using a combination of heli-torch, terra-torch, and drip-touch ignition methods. NMI works diligently and responsibly to ensure the ignition and containment of each prescribed fire is completed efficiently and effectively within the established boundaries of the prescription. Every forester that participates in our fire program has extensive knowledge, training, and experience operating under these conditions and within the terms set forth by local laws and regulations.

Reforestation

Northwest Management Inc. has overseen various reforestation/planting projects. NMI coordinates and administers the planting of over 1,500,000 seedlings annually throughout the northwest. The majority of these seedlings are for reforestation of industry-owned forest property. Our clients rely on NMI to oversee the efficient and effective completion of their planting operations. Specifications for planting on industrial forest ground are highly selective with little tolerance for poorly planted seedlings. NMI is accountable not only for the quality of the planting, but for the timely organization of seedling storage and planting crews. Many of our clients have large scale operations that require precise timing and coordination due to many factors.

In addition industry-owned reforestation administration, NMI administrates the planting of over 50,000 seedlings on average annually for non-industrial private landowners. NMI has several reforestation specialists on staff that will see your project from start to finish. This includes:

Project Design

Seedling acquisition

Site Preparation

Planting Administration

Seedling Protection

“The defining virtues of the sustainable forest vary tremendously among people. Parks or preserves, habitat or watershed mosaics, multiple-use or industrial forests, and short rotation farm plantations are all sustainable from some point of view if the conditions in which they grow balance inflows and outflows overtime.” – J. Romm. Sustainable forests and sustainable forestry. Journal of Forestry. 92(7):35-39. 1994